Panic Disorder Not So Mental After All

[Cort]

The findings may change how physicians and psychiatrists view the boundaries within and between psychiatric and medical disorders.

“Our argument is that delineations in medicine can be arbitrary and that some disorders that are viewed as multiple disparate and independent conditions may best be viewed as a single spectrum disorder with a common genetic etiology,” Dr. Coplan.
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@Merida
When you have a "mental" illness like panic disorder researchers look for evidence of other "mental" disorders but they usually stop there. But what about the links panic disorder has to "physical" disorders? This subject interests me because anxiety is something I never experienced until I got ME/CFS. I probably don't really experience it how - but a feeling of anxiousness and an inability to settle down has been pervasive. That I feel must have physical roots.

This study found that people with panic disorder had a tendency to a wide variety of other physical disorders. They included joint hypermobility syndrome, scoliosis, double-jointedness, mitral valve prolapse, easy bruising,fibromyalgia, migraine and chronic daily headache, irritable bowel syndrome, prostatitis/cystitis and hypothyroidism, asthma, nasal allergies, chronic fatigue syndrome.

That's probably an almost identical set of comorbid disorders to ME/CFS and FM. Something is going on here....​

• http://psychcentral.com/news/2015/07/10/panic-disorder-linked-to-physical-illnesses/86675.html

Jeremy D. Coplan, M.D., professor of psychiatry at SUNY Downstate Medical Center, and colleagues has documented a high rate of association between panic disorder and four domains of physical illness.

The findings may change how physicians and psychiatrists view the boundaries within and between psychiatric and medical disorders.
“Patients who appear to have certain somatic disorders — illnesses for which there is no detectable medical cause and which physicians may consider to be imagined by the patient — may instead have a genetic propensity to develop a series of real, related illnesses,” says Dr. Coplan, an expert in neuropsychopharmacology.

The researchers found a high association between panic disorder, bipolar disorder, and physical illness. Saliently, they discoverer a significantly higher prevalence of certain physical illnesses among patients with panic disorder when compared to the general population.

“Panic disorder itself may be a predictor for a number of physical conditions previously considered unrelated to mental conditions, and for which there may be no or few biological markers,” explains Dr. Coplan.

As reported in the Journal of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences, the researchers proposed the existence of a spectrum syndrome comprising a core anxiety disorder and four related domains, for which they have coined the term ALPIM:

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A = Anxiety disorder (mostly panic disorder);
L = Ligamentous laxity (joint hypermobility syndrome, scoliosis, double-jointedness, mitral valve prolapse, easy bruising);
P = Pain (fibromyalgia, migraine and chronic daily headache, irritable bowel syndrome, prostatitis/cystitis);
I = Immune disorders (hypothyroidism, asthma, nasal allergies, chronic fatigue syndrome); and
M = Mood disorders (major depression, Bipolar II and Bipolar III disorder, tachyphylaxis. Two thirds of patients in the study with mood disorder had diagnosable bipolar disorder and most of those patients had lost response to antidepressants).

Joint laxity was observed in 59.3 percent of patients in the study compared with a prevalence of approximately 10 percent to 15 percent in the general population; fibromyalgia was observed in 80.3 percent of the subjects compared with approximately 2.1 percent to 5.7 percent in the general population; and allergic rhinitis was observed in 71.1 percent of subjects, whereas its prevalence is approximately 20 percent in the general population.

 

[Who Me?]

I saw this. I think it's more of a problem than benefit.

Just another way to call us crazy and make it harder to get a correct DX.

 

[Cort]

I saw this. I think it's more of a problem than benefit.

Just another way to call us crazy and make it harder to get a correct DX.

I think it's just science! The physical/psychological divide has got to fall....Why shouldn't a disorder cause both? The brain is a complex place - why would anyone expect problems with the brain not to cause all sorts of symptoms?

 

[Who Me?]

I agree but when it comes to ME/CFS it just seems like another way to say it's psychological.

 

[Cort]

I can understand that....look what it does for people with panic disorder. It puts them in this realm of diseases.....

"panic disorder had a tendency to a wide variety of other physical disorders. They included joint hypermobility syndrome, scoliosis, double-jointedness, mitral valve prolapse, easy bruising,fibromyalgia, migraine and chronic daily headache, irritable bowel syndrome, prostatitis/cystitis and hypothyroidism, asthma, nasal allergies, chronic fatigue syndrome."

What a change for them!